86% give the government a passing grade; while 14% would mark it an F. Our latest Spark Advocacy nationwide polling wrapped up late this week, with a large sample of 4462 adults across Canada. Here’s what we find as Parliament gets ready to rise for the summer. Overall satisfaction with the “way in which the federal government is handling its...
Eleanor Olszewski jokes that, like most good Albertans, she originally comes from Saskatchewan. Born in Swift Current, Sask., Olszewski called the small city home for only a couple of years. Her family moved to Medicine Hat, Alta. where she was raised, before leaving for Edmonton to attend university, achieving degrees first in pharmacy and then later law, eventually settling down...
Prime Minister Mark Carney is in Ireland where he will drum up business and investment with European peers and visit his ancestors' home on the Emerald Isle. Carney arrived in Dublin Saturday morning, where he will meet with Micheál Martin, Ireland's head of government, and attend a welcoming ceremony at Dublin Castle. The leaders are set to hold a joint...
Lots of good talk on Good Talk this week, starting with Chantal and Bruce on Mark Carney's trip to Paris today and his talks with Emmanuel Macron. France is hosting the G7 next week, but for many, it's really a G6 with Donald Trump's America, no friend of the group. That and CUSMA and social media bans top the discussion...
Our latest Spark Advocacy nationwide polling wrapped up late this week, with a large sample of 4462 adults across Canada. Here’s what we find as Parliament gets ready to rise for the summer. Overall satisfaction with the “way in which the federal government is handling its responsibilities” sits at 66%. Over 12 data points in our tracking since Carney took...
The summer is a pivotal season for Prime Minister Mark Carney as the U.S.-Canada trade relationship enters a forced inflexion point with the scheduled joint review of the U.S.-Canada-Mexico trade agreement — which U.S. President Donald Trump has once again threatened to blow up. Carney enters this period with signs that the grace extended by Canadians to his renewed Liberal...
U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has been leading the charge in the Trump administration on the Gordie Howe International Bridge, which has seen its opening delayed at the request of the United States, a White House official said Friday. Speaking on background, the administration official said Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer spoke with the White House recently about the bridge but...
With a $75-million investment to Canadian Blood Services to increase domestic blood and plasma supplies for health emergencies, the federal Liberals have provided a first look at their plans to bolster Canada’s medical countermeasures, which were classified as a “sovereign capability” in the Defence Industrial Strategy released earlier this year. But two other life sciences experts say the strategy’s health...
Government House Leader Steven MacKinnon’s recent acknowledgment that new legislation may be needed to accelerate approvals for major projects is an admission of long-standing failure. Canada’s regulatory system for infrastructure and resource development has become slow, uncertain, and politicized. While Ottawa now speaks of one or two year approval windows and continues expanding entities like the Major Projects Office, deeper...
It's not even close. It's not even close to being close. We wait for them to make a move, do something, try to win the hearts and minds of the undecided, answer the actual questions on people's minds. Heaven knows the separatists have the attention of Canada now. Newshounds can tell you how every single day story-hungry editors want the...
In a world riven with strife, with democracy and dignity under daily assault in the United States by its president, and with global hegemons rejecting the sovereignty of nations, Canadians should take careful stock of what we have and who we are. Canada is blessed with vast geography, abundant natural resources and an educated and diverse population. We have the...
There are times when you feel the ground shift because something genuinely historic is underway. That was my reaction Monday morning watching Louise Arbour installed as Canada’s 31st Governor General. It was a defining, quintessentially Canadian experience, not just for the pageantry, the 21-gun salute, or the high ceremony of passing the torch. What made it remarkable was the passage...
The people leading Canada’s trade talks are not as worried as you might think about Donald Trump’s latest threats to end North American free trade. It was somewhat jarring, this week, to take in the calm demeanour projected by chief trade negotiator Janice Charette, at an automotive conference, and lead cabinet minister Dominic LeBlanc, and ambassador Mark Wiseman at a...
It was a slow week on the separatism front, but then, at the last minute, Albertans got something new to be confused about. The government announced Friday it's creating a panel — because that's what it does — to assess the costs of separation. This was expected after Premier Danielle Smith went on about $400-billion costs, big prices for our...
Quebec’s federalists face a crucial and highly consequential choice ahead of the next provincial election, to be held Oct. 5. Faced with the prospect of a Parti Québécois (PQ) victory under the leadership of Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, flanked by a nationalist Coalition Avenir Québec (CAQ) and a separatist Québec Solidaire, Quebec could soon be plunged into a third referendum on...
When I wrote about Jonathan Haidt’s book “The Anxious Generation” two years ago, I was struck by the thought experiment he uses as an opening. Imagine, he wrote, if a tech lord proposed sending your teenage daughter to join the first human settlement on Mars. She’s eager to go — all my friends will be there! — but it turns...
Poilievre needs more people to like the sound of his voice. To hear him say things that make them feel confident and hopeful, not depressed. To reveal some self-awareness.
This fall’s referendum on secession in Alberta – well, not on secession, but on whether to have a referendum on secession – promises another chance to observe a familiar phenomenon: federalists “fighting for Canada” on separatist terms. There has been no shortage of volunteers to play Captain Canada in the campaign to come, notably Danielle Smith, the Premier, and Pierre...
Prime Minister Mark Carney has confronted two critical but unrelated challenges with performative techniques that have been greeted with understandable skepticism by the two target audiences. In both cases — the need to build infrastructure to transport oil to tidewater and on to overseas markets and the failure to counter the worst antisemitism since the Second World War — Carney...
Pete Hoekstra is not quite in the super league of undiplomatic diplomats. Before he was British foreign minister, Boris Johnson once offended the entire nation of Papua New Guinea by linking it to cannibalism. But the current U.S. ambassador can claim the rare accomplishment of uniting Canadians coast to coast in their animosity toward him.
Quebec Premier Christine Fréchette has given her governing Quebec party a pulse with a mix of seriousness outside the province and calculated wedge politics at home.
The daily question period in the House of Commons generally subtracts from the sum of human knowledge, and Tuesday’s episode was an absolute belter in terms of confusing anyone watching. It kicked off with Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre calling the “phantom” high-speed railway between Quebec City and Toronto “a boondoggle.” This from the Conservative party that has called on the...
Even though they have a mammoth money lead on the Democrats, fundraisers for U.S. President Donald Trump never let up. Their solicitations come at a relentless pace, like corn being popped. I have a sense of it because I strangely got on the Republicans’ mailing list as a MAGA supporter and potential donor. My inbox is bombarded several times a...
At the Pride flag raising on Parliament Hill on Tuesday, local activists and onlookers mingled with staffers, MPs and senators in the hot sun while waiting for Prime Minister Mark Carney to arrive. A group of Conservative MPs were present, including out lesbian MP Melissa Lantsman, though none would dare be photographed on stage at the end of the event...
One of Ontario’s biggest and most reliable automakers is warning Canadians not to take its presence here for granted. “Companies don’t automatically keep building vehicles in the same country just because it’s always been that way,” Honda Canada president Dave Jamieson told an industry summit convened by the Automotive Parts Manufacturers’ Association in Vaughan this week.
There is zero chance, absolutely none, that separatist leaders will kick Premier Danielle Smith out of office and take over the United Conservative Party. That's how they talk, of course. They're going after the premier because they don't like her referendum question and her embrace of federalism, Alberta style. In the last column, I tried to explain the movement against...
There’s a lineup of imperfect candidates who could make the case for Canada ahead of Alberta’s referendum-to-have-a-referendum on sovereignty in the fall. There’s Prime Minister Mark Carney, of course, the most prominent federalist in the country and one who happened to spend the majority of his childhood and adolescence in Alberta. But Mr. Carney is Albertan in the same way...
Today was the day when Donald Trump issued the inevitable pronouncement that he’d prefer not to renew the Canada-US-Mexico (CUSMA) agreement at all. While only time will tell how much of that statement was posturing, it raises the question of how Team Canada will approach this new phase in the evolution of the deal. This time last year, many observers...
The Irish political pilgrimage — or world-leader “roots tour” as an adaptation of the ancestral tourism that fuels so much Blarney-Stone kissing — is a classic of personal diplomacy pioneered by President John F. Kennedy. “If this nation had achieved its present political and economic stature a century or so ago,” Kennedy said in his speech to the Oireachtas Éireann...
The UCP is cooked if separatists take control. Well aware of the threat, Premier Danielle Smith's forces are quietly acting against UCP rebels who want to kick her out of office. It's happening in battles for riding nominations as well as party board elections at the UCP convention Nov. 27 to 29. This is heating up fast. Smith simply can't...
In recent days, both the Toronto Star and The Globe and Mail have written pieces on some limited degree of dissension in the federal Liberal caucus around how Prime Minister Mark Carney allegedly interacts with his team members. The Star story talked about how the prime minister apparently yells, and wants solutions not problems brought forward by his MPs. While...
Earlier this week, Prime Minister Mark Carney and MPs from other political parties came together to raise the Pride flag on Parliament Hill. But an advocacy group that helps LGBTQ refugees come to Canada and the U.S says the federal government's new border law is putting people at risk of being sent back to countries where they face persecution. Devon...
When Mark Carney arrived in Davos in January and warned that “middle powers” risked ending up “on the menu” of the “hegemons,” he sounded like a Canadian prime minister on the hunt for a foreign policy.
The concept of Canadian Arctic sovereignty is rapidly becoming outdated as much of the world eyes the region as part of an intense global competition that will blur traditional lines and beliefs, a conference on Canada-U.S. relations was told this week. The wakeup call came from Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, the former president of Iceland and now the chair of Arctic...
The federal government tabled a bill Friday to change the way Canada bars imports of products made with forced labour following an American tariff threat. Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand was in Paris with Prime Minister Mark Carney as the legislation was tabled by her parliamentary secretary, Rob Oliphant. "This will be a made-in-Canada solution to an international problem," he...
Independent grocers are welcoming the federal government's national food security strategy, aimed at boosting competition among grocers, growing local produce year-round and improving consumer affordability.
Canada and France will deepen their defence and industrial co-operation through a new general security of information agreement, Prime Minister Mark Carney said in Paris on Friday. Carney made the announcement in a joint statement alongside French President Emmanuel Macron, ahead of a bilateral meeting between the two at the Palais de l’Elysée. “Businesses in both of our countries are...
ATB report points to tariffs, Iran war and separatism as possible risks. Alberta’s economy is staying the course despite uncertain tariff policies from the United States and the impact of the U.S and Israel-Iran war on global oil supply, according to a new report released Thursday. “Moving fast in the slow lane: Alberta’s economy in 2026 and 2027” is the...
German defence minister, army chief point to a narrow timeline. They're not alone. Boris Pistorius doesn't look like a man prone to alarmism. Germany's defence minister is frank and plain-spoken, but also deliberate with his words and intention. When he talks about Russia, the future of the West and the possibility of another European war, the message however becomes stark...
Prime Minister Mark Carney has landed in Paris, where he is set to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron ahead of the G7 summit next week. A government official briefing reporters before the trip framed the meeting as Canada passing the G7 presidency baton to France and said the leaders likely will discuss how to advance a strategic partnership between...
Finance Minister Francois-Phillippe Champagne says he "followed all the rules" to make sure he wasn't in a conflict of interest related to the Alto high-speed rail project. The minister testified at the parliamentary ethics committee Thursday after months of scrutiny from the federal Conservatives over his involvement in the proposed $90-billion high-speed rail project between Toronto and Quebec City. Champagne...
Prime Minister Mark Carney says the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge was delayed at the request of the United States -- but the issue is separate from negotiations on a critical continental trade pact. "At the request of the United States, we agreed to delay the opening and take the necessary time to resolve outstanding issues, a few...
As Ottawa pushes to get “more” economic benefits from its multibillion-dollar F-35 fighter jets procurement, such as more domestic jobs created, the aircraft’s American manufacturer Lockheed Martin isn’t giving any indication if it’s willing to offer anything “more,” saying opportunities already exist in a global partnership program of which Canada is a member. Prime Minister Mark Carney (Nepean, Ont.) ordered...
The Liberal government has announced a national food security strategy aimed at giving Canadians more access to locally produced fruit, vegetables and other fresh items at lower prices. The plan outlined Thursday is intended to change the way food is bought, sold, transported and distributed in Canada to better support farmers, small independent players and consumers. The government says the...
The Canadian government gave notice Thursday it’s introducing new legislation to stop the import of goods made with forced labour as the U.S. threatens new tariffs on foreign trading partners. Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand on Thursday told the House of Commons that within days, the government will be tabling “an Act respecting the prohibition of the importation of goods...
Alberta's government has filed its appeal of a judge's decision to throw out a petition looking to force a vote on the province quitting Canada. Premier Danielle Smith criticized the ruling last month, calling it "anti-democratic," and promised to appeal. Court of King's Bench Justice Shaina Leonard found the referendum petition shouldn't have been issued under provincial law and that...
Political discontent may be growing across the country, but this quarter’s premier approval ratings show a clear concentration of trouble among three of the country’s most prominent leaders. In Alberta, British Columbia and Ontario, Danielle Smith, David Eby and Doug Ford all fall to personal lows, each facing a different mix of governing fatigue, economic pressure and controversy at home...
Prime Minister Mark Carney took part in a video call involving Group of Seven countries and China today to address global economic imbalances. A spokesperson for the Prime Minister's Office confirmed Carney took part in the meeting led by French President Emmanuel Macron. The government of France says priorities for the G7 Leaders' Summit next week will include reducing global...
The United States' top diplomat in Canada says that when U.S. President Donald Trump says the U.S. doesn't need anything from its northern neighbour, he's actually looking for ways to collaborate. "When the president says we don't need this from Canada, or there's nothing we need, America has a tremendous amount of things where we have a need," U.S. Ambassador...
A Conservative MP who helps shape Canada’s AI and auto policy owns stock in the American software company Palantir and carmaker Tesla. An August 2025 ethics disclosure indicates that Ontario MP Michael Guglielmin owns at least $10,000 of stock in Palantir, which a member of his own party has criticized for its data gathering practices.
One day after President Donald Trump declared the United States doesn’t need anything from Canada, his ambassador in Ottawa offered a notable exception: potash. Canada is the world’s top exporter of the essential fertilizer used to maximize crop production — and it’s one commodity U.S. Ambassador to Canada Pete Hoekstra said the United States needs as the fate of free...
PM has said strategy would strengthen domestic food production, improve access to affordable food. While the grocery rebates hitting lower-income bank accounts this month offer short-term relief for high prices, Mark Carney's government is set to release a new plan on Thursday for fixing some of the root causes behind the spike in food prices. When the prime minister announced...
A Toronto police officer has died after being shot during an investigation believed to be tied to the United States, said U.S. ambassador Pete Hoekstra. Toronto police said the officer was shot after an exchange of gunfire with a suspect in the northwest end of the city Thursday morning.
The opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge has been delayed as the relationship between Canada and the United States continues to be upended by U.S. President Donald Trump. The interim chief executive of the Windsor-Detroit Bridge Authority said Thursday that Canada and the U.S. have agreed to a delay as the two countries attempt to "resolve any outstanding issues."...
Despite agreeing to a “common set of principles” for a safer and more secure digital space for minors, leaders of G7 countries are unlikely to come to a consensus on government regulations against online harms, according to senior government officials. The background briefing was given to reporters ahead of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trip to Ireland and France later this...
U.S. President Donald Trump is again saying the American economy does not need anything from Canada or Mexico and he is "not looking to renew" the continental trade pact. Trump made the comments in the Oval Office Wednesday when asked about the July 1 deadline to renew the Canada-U.S.-Mexico agreement on trade, known in Canada as CUSMA. If the deadline...
Trump administration's refusal to share could lead to a missing link for NATO. Canada's planned purchase of the Saab GlobalEye surveillance jet faces significant political and technical hurdles if the aircraft is going to be fully integrated into NORAD. Much of the success or failure of the effort will depend on convincing the Trump administration and the Pentagon to share...
As countries including Canada move toward social media bans in an attempt to keep youths safe online, tech companies are in a tug of war over who should be the gatekeepers. Executives from Snapchat and Meta, the owner of Instagram, Facebook and Threads, have argued it should be app stores rather than platforms charged with verifying the ages of users...
The federal privacy commissioner says sexual deepfakes created by Elon Musk's Grok AI chatbot violated Canada's privacy law. The watchdog says Grok's AI image generation tool was launched without adequate safeguards and didn't properly consider harms to privacy. The commissioner launched an investigation in January to examine the proliferation of sexualized deepfakes created by Grok and shared on the X...
'It's a G6 in all but name,' says international affairs expert. One year after hosting the G7 summit in Alberta, Prime Minister Mark Carney is set to rejoin world leaders — including U.S. President Donald Trump — for their first meeting since the start of the U.S.-Israeli offensive in Iran. Carney will attend the G7 leaders' summit in Évian-les-Bains, France...
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith came to the Senate at a very different moment for Democrats.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- One was a rotating disc that sent out beams of light. Another was a shining red orb of a hue the observer had never seen before. Then there was the one compared to a potato, and also a bean, but with a coat of shimmering, fish-like scales.
WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Donald Trump said the U.S. is close to signing a deal with Iran to wind down the war, with a memorandum of understanding to be signed in the coming days.
FBI agents have searched the office of an Ohio group that supports voter registration efforts, seizing documents and computer files, a board member of the organization said Friday.
When Mark Carney arrived in Davos in January and warned that “middle powers” risked ending up “on the menu” of the “hegemons,” he sounded like a Canadian prime minister on the hunt for a foreign policy.
Prime Minister Mark Carney has landed in Paris, where he is set to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron ahead of the G7 summit next week. A government official briefing reporters before the trip framed the meeting as Canada passing the G7 presidency baton to France and said the leaders likely will discuss how to advance a strategic partnership between...
Prime Minister Mark Carney says the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge was delayed at the request of the United States -- but the issue is separate from negotiations on a critical continental trade pact. "At the request of the United States, we agreed to delay the opening and take the necessary time to resolve outstanding issues, a few...
Despite agreeing to a “common set of principles” for a safer and more secure digital space for minors, leaders of G7 countries are unlikely to come to a consensus on government regulations against online harms, according to senior government officials. The background briefing was given to reporters ahead of Prime Minister Mark Carney’s trip to Ireland and France later this...
'It's a G6 in all but name,' says international affairs expert. One year after hosting the G7 summit in Alberta, Prime Minister Mark Carney is set to rejoin world leaders — including U.S. President Donald Trump — for their first meeting since the start of the U.S.-Israeli offensive in Iran. Carney will attend the G7 leaders' summit in Évian-les-Bains, France...
Canada and Australia cannot afford to be passive actors in the increasingly turbulent world of resource geopolitics.
A collection of SubStack publishing within Canadian public affairs.
Secrecy surrounding cabinet documents is so absolute in Canada that critics look to theology and astrophysics for metaphors to describe it. Federal cabinet records in Canada are treated as “sacred artefacts to be shrouded in mystery for decades, hidden in a black hole beyond the contemplation of judges, commissioners, or citizens.”
In 2007, Roger Martin, then dean of the Rotman School of Management at University of Toronto, wrote a book called The Opposable Mind. It argued that the most successful leaders tend to be “integrative thinkers,” by which he meant they tackled problems holistically rather than breaking them down into component parts. Instead of seeking trade-offs, they are at ease with...
“Despite the ongoing conflict between Hezbollah and Israel which has resulted in thousands of deaths and injuries…Lebanon moved forward with the ban on antipersonnel landmines,” said the Ottawa-based group Mines Action Canada in a statement, celebrating the new addition.
As Donald Trump prepares for his big 80th birthday UFC Cage Fight on the lawn of the White House, the rest of the world waits pessimistically for its leaders to take on the global challenges of this frightening new era at the G7 next week in Evian, France. Louise, Jeremy and Peter discuss what's at stake, and how these same...
Peter Mazereeuw speaks with David Fraser, an expert in internet and privacy law at McInnes Cooper, about Minister Marc Miller's new bill to restrict social media access and content, the Safe Social Media Act.
At Issue this week: Canada grapples with more Trump threats to free trade, and a delay in opening the new Gordie Howe bridge. The Liberals move against social media but not everyone's on board. And Pierre Poilievre pitches Albertans on staying in Canada.
Pierre Poilievre skips the governor general's installation and heads to Calgary with a new pitch: project hope, not project fear. Nick Taylor-Vaisey and Mickey Djuric break down his bid to talk Alberta separatists out of leaving, and what it means for a Conservative leader who spent years calling Canada broken. Plus, Justin Trudeau works a red carpet with Katy Perry...
